The Facebook and Instagram pages of Kashmir Life, a Kashmir-based independent news portal, became inaccessible in India on Monday afternoon after Meta restricted access at the request of law enforcement authorities.
There had been no prior public notice or communication before access was blocked, the media organisation said.
Subsequently, Meta put an auto-response on the page stating that it had restricted access to the content in India “pursuant to a notice from ‘The Government of India V Law Enforcement’ under Section 79(3)(b) of the Information Technology Act, 2000.”
The communication advised the organisation to contact the issuing authority for further information and stated that details regarding content restrictions based on local law are available through Meta’s Transparency Centre.
Section 79(3)(b) of the Information Technology Act, 2000, empowers authorities to require intermediaries to disable access to content upon receiving actual knowledge through a court order or government notification.
On Instagram, a notice displayed on the platform reads: “We received a legal request to restrict this content. We reviewed it against our policies and conducted a legal and human rights assessment. After the review, we restricted access to the content in the location where it goes against local law.”
Its verified Facebook page has approximately 1.8 million followers, while the Instagram account has almost 200 thousand followers.
